Marc Acito, Attack of the Theater People

[April 23rd, 2008]

The sequel to Portlander Acito’s 2004 coming-of-gay comedy How I Paid for College (Broadway, 356 pages, $12.95) finds its self-obsessed protagonist, Edward Zanni, kicked out of Juilliard, working as a “party motivator” at ritzy bar mitzvahs and moonlighting as a corporate spy for a jaw-droppingly sexy stockbroker of questionable ethics. As before, Eddie bumbles his way through each new bizarre affair, motivated in part by his love of the stage but mostly by adolescent lust. It’s featherweight dick lit, but the novel is readable thanks to Acito’s clever skewering of pop culture and the theater world alike. Acito has earned a lucrative audience of the sort of people who devour first-person romantic comedies, but his real talents are in satire.